


Skeptical Belief

by mediocrityatbest



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Gen, M/M, Other, romantic relationships are primarily background
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-25
Updated: 2019-10-25
Packaged: 2021-01-03 04:51:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21173723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mediocrityatbest/pseuds/mediocrityatbest
Summary: Sanders Sides Spooky Month by @sanderssidescelebrations on Tumblr!Day Seven Prompt: Ghost huntingLogan has always believed in ghosts, despite the facts that his life has been totally free of the paranormal and he's a very skeptical person. The crux of the issue, then, is that he must find his own proof.Easy enough.





	Skeptical Belief

It was two in the morning, and Logan watched Remus spread their sleeping bags out on the dusty floor, open and layered one on top of the other. Logan would’ve complained, said that they were taking up more space than using them as they were meant to would, but it was getting increasingly cold (colder than it should have been, maybe) and if he didn’t sleep next to his space heater of a boyfriend, he might get hypothermia and die.

So spreading out the sleeping bags would do.

“If we die here, I am going to kill you,” Dee said. He was curled into Virgil’s chest, who was on the far side of Remus. The cold must be pretty awful for him. It shouldn’t have been so cold.

“No one else who came into this house has died from any sort of paranormal experience,” Logan said for the umpteenth time since they had arrived at the house. “In fact, it’s impossible to prove that anyone has ever died from the paranormal because we have yet to even prove its existence. Which is the exact reason we are here.” Logan slid under the blankets on the outer edge of their giant blanket-pillow-conga-line. The eight of them had all come with separate sleeping bags, but it was seeming more and more like preserving body heat and stealing each others’ was going to be the priority.

“Logan, do you even believe in the paranormal?” Roman demanded from across the room. He was sitting in the blankets next to Patton who was on Dee’s far side. “It doesn’t seem like a very logical thing to do.”

“Yes,  _ Roman _ , obviously I believe in the paranormal, otherwise I would not be trying to prove it exists. You know, I already explained to you why we are doing this. Do you live to ignore me?”

“No,” Roman said, offense coating his voice. “I live to love Patton.” He grabbed at Patton sides to make him shriek.

“I’m just glad we’re all hanging out together,” Patton giggled, wiggling away from Roman’s fingers. “It’s been so long, and even if it is in a dirty old house, well, at least we’re all here.”

“Aw, Patton, that’s so sweet,” Emile gushed. He was on the other side of Roman. Remy was pushed to the farthest edge from Logan, and about as happy about this whole thing as a  [ honey badger ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8WtUn8BoLc) . Honestly, Logan could not have told you why they all decided to come; only two of them were invested in the investigation (Remus and Virgil), two wanted to hang out with everybody (Patton and Emile), and Dee, Roman, and Remy were actively against coming here.

Still, they’d all shown up, and now they were all part of Logan’s very first filmed investigation. He’s been wanting to do it for a while, for science. (It’s only breaking and entering if you’re not doing it for scientific purposes, it’s only bullshit if you don’t record the results.) Virgil, just as determined to catch a ghost on camera as Logan was, had brought one of his good, professional cameras for them to use. Logan was eternally grateful for his best friend’s support.

Remus was invested because, despite what the others thought, he was actually very supportive of what Logan liked. He also wanted to break and enter and provoke a spirit, but in the name of science, so did Logan. So they were pretty damn well aligned on that front.

“Patton, I thought you would be  _ against _ breaking the law,” Remy said, sounding snappier than usual. Logan sometimes wondered if Remy was psychic; he had an uncanny ability to foresee how things would turn out, and he often gave random pieces of advice for no discernable reason. (He once told Logan he might save what he was working on. Logan had, simply because it was good to save your documents often. Not two minutes later his laptop crashed and lost all the progress he’d made after the save. It was totally inexplicable.)

“I mean, nobody’s lived here in a long time,” Patton said. “And the worst thing in the house is probably just some cockroaches.”

“Cockroach? Where?” demanded Remus. “I’ll take care of it.”

“There better not be any cockroaches in here,” Roman said. “I will walk right out of this house and take that van all the way back to the city. I am not waking up with bugs in my hair.” Roman shivered so dramatically it pulled the blankets off Logan. He yanked them back, goosebumps already breaking out over his skin. It was too cold in this house for October, and especially when the low for the night wasn’t even supposed to dip to thirty.

Logan jotted the information down in his notebook and then began adjusting Virgil’s camera.

“Don’t worry, Ro. I’m sure none of the bugs are going to come near us,” Patton murmured.

“Yeah,” Virgil added. “They won’t want to get too close to your snoring.” Dee snorted and Roman gasped.

“You take that back, Dark and Stormy! I do not snore!”

“Whatever lets you sleep at night,” Virgil said. “Even if you keep the rest of us awake.”

“Hey!” As the battle raged on, drawing in Remy and Emile too, Logan carefully set up whatever equipment he could reach without leaving the warmth of the blankets.

“What’re you doing with that?” Remus asked, pointing to the spirit box Logan was fiddling with.

“Making sure the calibrations are correct. It should pick up any voices that we can’t hear, assuming it all works. There is, unsurprisingly, little scientifically conducted research on the paranormal.”

“I do so love when you talk dirty to me, Lo,” Remus sighed, looking at Logan in a way that he could only describe as adoring. Logan flushed.

“If anybody is going to be talking dirty,” Dee interrupted, “it will be me and I will be talking about how disgusting our blankets are after touching this floor.” He dragged one finger across the floorboards and then held it up, gray even in the poor lighting. “Disgusting.”

“Shut up,” Virgil said. “I’m doing laundry when we get back and you know it.”

“I don’t want you to touch this muck, either.” Dee wiped his finger off on Remus’s blanket. “God, we’re all going to get infected and die.”

“Oh, it’s not that bad,” said Emile. “Plus, nothing can compare to what happened last time we went out on one of Logan’s adventures.”

“Scientific venture,” Logan corrected him, taking a sip of water before capping the bottle and placing it next to his pillow.

“Covered in cow shit,” Remy countered.

“And mud,” added Roman.

“Not to mention-”

“I thought it was fun,” said Remus. He pulled Logan to lay down on top of him. “We got to roll down a hill.”

“And got covered in  _ literal _ shit,” Roman said.

“You screamed like a baby,” Remus said fondly. He rubbed Logan’s arms. “You’re  _ freezing _ , Nerdy Wolverine. Are you okay?”

“It is quite cold,” Logan said. “But I assure you, I am capable of handling the cold.”

“Are you sure you’re okay, Lo?” Emile asked. It was the first time all night he’d sounded genuinely concerned. “It’s kind of stuffy over here.”

“It’s what?” Logan asked at the same time a cold draft hit his skin and a shiver wracked his body. He pulled himself up from Remus to grab the thermometer sitting a couple feet away. “Emile, what does the thermometer read?” There was a moment of silence as they shuffled around to reach it.

“It’s about sixty-five,” Remy said.

“I swear it feels hotter than that,” Emile added. “Let me see that.”

“That’s insane,” Logan whispered. He tapped on his thermometer a few times as though it were a broken remote. Then he began writing in notebook again.

“What is it, L?” Virgil asked, propping himself up on an elbow.

“This thermometer says  _ thirty-five _ ,” Logan said. “There is no way it should be that much hotter less than twenty feet away in an enclosed room. This is-this is impossible.” Remus took the thermometer out of Logan’s hand and took a look.

“Now it says forty,” he said. Logan spun to see, wrote more down.

“Pass it to Virgil,” Logan ordered, not looking up. “Emile, pass that one this way.” The thermometers made their way across the room, getting readings from each person as they went. Thirty-five at Logan, forty at Remus, forty-five with Virgil, all the way down to sixty five where Remy was. It  _ was not possible _ to have so much variation in such a small area. There weren’t even any warm air currents due to the chill outside and the heating hadn’t working in almost two decades.

“I need to look at the heating and cooling units,” Logan muttered. “The electricity, possible drafts. With a stretch of logic, this could maybe not be paranormal, but it would take so many factors to line up that it is almost entirely unprobable.” He looked up from his notebook, felt the smile on his face that he couldn’t stop. “This could be real, scientific data of an anomaly at least, if not something supernatural.”

“Do it in the morning,” Patton said. “It’s already late, you don’t need to stay up any longer, kiddo.”

“But something could have changed by the morning. For accurate, scientific data, I need to do it now.”

“Nope,” Remus said, wrapping his arms around Logan and rolling him to the inside of their blankets. “We already stayed up all night last night-”

“ _ Ew _ . I did not need to know that,” said Roman, gagging.

“-and I’m exhausted, but I can’t sleep without my teddy bear.” Remus squeezed Logan and Logan was engulfed in his warmth. “You’re not allowed to get up.”

“ _ Remus _ ,” he protested.

“Nope. Nighty-night.” Remus laid on top of him.

“Night, everybody,” Patton added. “Sweet dreams.”

“You can’t control your dreams. Unless you’re a lucid dreamer, and that’s pretty rare, but anyway,” Emile said, curling into Remy, “I hope it’s a refreshing sleep.” Agreeances of either sentiment were echoing through the room, and then the lights were dimmed and they were all trying to sleep.

Everyone except for Logan and Virgil who had come here to catch a ghost, goddamnit. They were going to stay up even if it involved lying about it. So Logan began doing complicated math in his head, hoping that would keep him awake until he could get to his water bottle for his energy drinks. A full night’s sleep could come later; they had a mission.

About thirty minutes later, Logan carefully sat up and shifted to look at some of his equipment. It was a couple degrees colder, but nothing else of note had happened. Logan reached over and poked Virgil’s shoulder. Virgil stayed still just long enough to make Logan think he’d fallen asleep, and then he slowly started moving.

“You were making me doubt your dedication,” Logan whispered. Virgil shushed him and gently pulled Dee off his chest. As soon as Virgil moved out of the way, Remus and Dee rolled into each other, which conveniently created just enough space for the pair to sit on the outside of their blanket train.

“Dee’s a light sleeper, I had to be sure he was out,” Virgil said. “He’d definitely kill me for staying up  _ again _ .”

“Well, he can complain about it tomorrow once we have a spirit on film and evidence to back it up.” Logan reached for his water bottle. “What do you-uhm.” He couldn’t find his drink. Logan looked toward his pillow where he’d put in, but there was nothing there. “V, my drink is gone.”

“Where’d you put it?”

“Right there.” Logan motioned. “Did you move it?” he asked, staring at the spot. Virgil sighed.

“Why would I?” he whispered, not nearly as bothered as Logan by the bottle’s disappearance. Then again, it wasn’t Virgil’s bottle. “Remus probably did, though. That’s the exact kind of thing he’d do to undermine the integrity of the investigation.”

“I do not appreciate you quoting me at me out of context about my own boyfriend,” Logan said, “though it is nice to know you listen.” He searched the room with his eyes. “You don’t see it anywhere, do you? I need to know where it went.”

“Uh,” Virgil muttered, searching now too. “There. By the T.V. stand.” He squinted, a little more concerned. “You should probably ask Remus if he moved it.” Logan shoved Remus’s shoulder just enough that he would answer. There was a fine line between coherent and able-to-remember.

“Um, Remus, did you move my drink?” Logan asked, eyes fixed on the bottle.

“No,” Remus mumbled, mostly asleep and definitely not in any state to be moving things without alerting Logan. He pulled Dee a little closer.

“Huh,” Logan said, and pointed the camera at the bottle. He shared an excited glance with Virgil. Carefully, he removed himself from the sleeping pile and crept across the room. He could voice over this part later. For now it would be better to catch anything happening around him with the night vision on the camera, and try not to wake the others for what could be nothing.

“Logan, get back here,” Virgil hissed. “You don’t know how that got over there.”

“There’s only one way to find out,” Logan retorted, picking up the bottle. He inspected it closely and, to his bewilderment, found an ashy handprint. “Look at this.” He presented the bottle to the camera before passing it to Virgil. A shiver worked through Logan’s body and it was hard to say whether it was from fear, anticipation, or the cold.

“What the fuck?” Virgil whispered. “L, what the fuck?”

“It’s proof,” Logan said, voice shaking. “It’s-” A creak sounded from the next floor up, like someone stepping on the old floorboards. He froze, looked at Virgil.

“We’re investigating that,” Virgil said.

“Don’t forget the camera,” Logan said. They pulled on their boots and Logan grabbed the spirit box and thermometer. Virgil lifted the camera and nodded at him. Taking the lead, Logan set off for the stairs. They ascended silently, listening for any other errant noises. At the top, another creak sounded. They froze, watching intently. Virgil nudged Logan’s arms and mimed talking.

“Hello? Is anybody there?” Logan asked. They waited with bated breath for an answer, but none was forthcoming. “Let’s just keep going, see what’s up here that we could’ve missed earlier,” he muttered to the camera. They went forward at a snail’s pace, hoping for anything to happen.

And then a door swung open with a terrifying creak.

“Need some oil on them hinges,” Virgil said, voice higher than it normally was. Logan gulped, staring.

“We’re going in, right?” he asked.

“Definitely,” Virgil said. He had a white-knuckled grip on his camera, and Logan shivered. He glanced at the thermometer: twenty-eight. Shit.

“It’s getting colder,” he said, inching closer to the door. Virgil snorted.

“I had no idea.” Logan heard his teeth chatter together, and then he shoved the door the rest of the way open. It whined the whole way, longer than even the squeakiest of hinges usually made noise, and then the door stopped. The room was empty save for two dark shoe prints. It looked like the same thing that had been on Logan’s water bottle.

He took a step closer. Virgil grabbed his arm like a vice. “Did anyone ever die in a fire here?”

“Henry Smith,” Logan said on autopilot. “1899. The entire house was destroyed. They rebuilt this one decades later, but the original was in this exact spot.”

“Okay. Okay,” Virgil said. He released Logan’s arm. “This is probably Henry Smith, then. Let’s do this.” Logan watched as Virgil steadied his shaking hands and then took one step into the room. Virgil followed.

“ ** _Come in_ ** ,” said a disembodied voice, just low enough to send shivers down Logan’s spine and settle a feeling of  _ wrong _ in his chest. His breath was knocked from his lungs and puffed in front of his face, visible.

“Oh, shit,” Virgil whispered. The shadows moved in a sort of humanoid shape, reaching out for them. “Oh, shit!” Virgil yelled at the same time Logan shouted, “Fuck!” They both were pulled out of the room by their shirts. Remy was standing there, madder than Logan had ever seen him.

“Run,” he snapped and raced for the steps. Virgil was on his tail, Logan half a step behind. There was a fourth pair of footsteps behind them, too close for comfort. Logan thought he could feel a hand ghost over hair, what the  _ fuck _ .

They clambered down the steps in a frenzy, not making any effort to be quiet, Virgil and Logan screaming. They hit the landing and launched themselves for the front door, at which point Virgil stopped, door held open.

“The others,” he gasped.

“We’ll get them,” Logan snapped, shoving the equipment into Virgil’s hands. “Get these outside before they get broken.” Virgil didn’t hesitate. Logan and Remy dived back for the living room, and Logan was glad to see they were all awake already.

“Lo? Is everything okay?” Remus asked. Logan grabbed his water bottle and Remus’s shoes.

“Who was screaming?” Patton yawned.

“We pissed something off, we need to leave. Now.” Logan pulled Remus up and then Dee. “Move, move. Come on, hurry up.” A dark laugh echoed down the stairs. Patton squeaked, and then everyone threw themselves into overdrive. They managed to get out the door in less than a minute. All the blankets were still in the house, but Logan was not half as concerned about the blankets as he was the evidence Virgil was cradling.

“Let me see what we got, let me see,” he muttered. Virgil was already playing the camera back.

“What just happened?” Emile asked, hands shaking ever so slightly. Logan motioned him over to see the small screen of the camera. They all crowded and watched as Logan crept up to the water bottle, watched Virgil and Logan both freeze, their mouths move.

“Where’s the sound?”

“I don’t know,” said Virgil frantically. He fiddled with the settings, smacked the camera gently against his hand a few times, but nothing happened. “That’s not right.”

“It’s-it’s fine. You’ve still got the spirit box, right?” Logan asked. Virgil nodded. They focused back on the screen, watched as Logan went up the stairs, watched as they both stopped moving again. They watched as the door opened by itself.

“Holy shit,” Roman whispered. They got closer to the door, watched as Logan almost stepped in, watched as Virgil stopped him. They watched as, in the room behind Logan, shadows moved along the floor, far too purposeful for comfort.

“I didn’t even see that,” said Virgil, sounding sick. Logan felt a hysterical giggle rise and swallowed it. He kept watching as they went into the room, as the shadows really started moving then, slithering toward them. He watched as they both stumbled out backward, watched as a face with red eyes and sharp teeth and a bone-chilling smile flashed in the darkness. Then they watched as the film corrupted and the file disappeared from the camera.

“What the fuck?” Virgil said numbly, looking at the camera. He clicked through his memory card. Everything was gone. “What the fuck?” He glanced at Logan.

“The spirit box,” Logan said, lurching for Virgil’s pocket. “The spirit box.” He pulled it out and rewound it to when the creak came from the second floor. It was all there, if staticky, up until Virgil said, “Okay. Okay. This is probably Henry Smith, then. Let’s do this.” The squeal it emitted then was so loud and unexpected that Logan dropped the spirit box - and watched it shatter on the concrete. It almost felt like it had been smacked out of his hand.

“I don’t understand half of what just happened,” Roman said slowly. “What did just happen?”

“How did you know where we were?” Virgil asked Remy, totally ignoring Roman. “Or that we were about to die.”

“You think I was dumb enough to go to sleep with you two idiots in the same place? No, ma’am. I learned my lesson with you two. Can’t trust y’all to go to the grocery store without almost dyin’.” Remy’s southern accent was rearing its head. Logan wanted to be offended, but Remy wasn’t wrong. Still, that didn’t negate that he was acting funny-like he was lying. “Now y’all better get in that damn car. We’re leavin’.” He stomped to the car and yanked the driver’s door open. Emile slid into the passenger seat. Logan collected the shards of his spirit box, useless as it was now, and climbed into the van. Remus settled in next to him, wrapping his arms around Logan.

“You’re freezing,” he muttered. His mustache tickled Logan’s face. “Are you okay?”

“We got actually evidence of a ghost, real video of things that happened, and it’s all gone,” Logan said. “I am the opposite of okay.”

“I know, Lolo,” Remus said. He pulled them a centimeter closer together. Any more and Logan would be sitting on Remus’s lap. “But at least you have your water bottle, right?” Logan startled, examined the water bottle he was, in fact, holding. It still had what looked like an ash handprint on it.

“I-yes, at least I have that.” Logan smiled. “Thank you, Remus.”

“Anytime,” Remus said, kissing Logan. The van started and Logan glanced out the window just in time to see that terrifying face leering at them from the second floor. He made panicked eye-contact with Virgil in the mirror.

“We’re coming back, right?” Virgil whispered in Logan’s ear from the seat behind him.

“Obviously,” Logan whispered back. Remus smiled dreamily.

“I can’t wait until we all die together,” he said. Logan snorted and leaned into him.

“At least it will be together,” Virgil whispered.

“Yes, at least there’s that.” Logan finally fell asleep for the first time in two days on the drive back into the city. It was almost morning, and none of them would be doing anything before noon, but Logan could sleep now and maybe when he woke, he’d find a new way to catch a ghost. It was just a matter of belief.


End file.
